Tag Archives: Alicante

Spain

Burning of the fogueres

At midnight on June 24th, the Fogueres de Sant Joan celebrates the “Crema” which is burning of the fogueres. The first foguere that is burnt is at the Ayuntamiento de Alicante (City Hall). A very large group of people gather at the Ayuntamiento de Alicante to wait for the official start which is the fireworks launched from the Castillo de Santa Bárbara in a palm tree design.

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crowd gathering at city hall for the crema

It was so crowded that we were not able to get close enough to see the foguere at city hall, which is approximately 4 storeys high and very beautiful.

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City hall foguere before it was burnt

We worked our way to the next foguere which was just around the corner from city hall. There was a large crowd there as well, but we managed to see most of the foguere being burnt.

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Foguere before it was burnt

https://youtu.be/MYgz7cIXu7o

Large crowds of people party and follow the  bomberos throughout the entire city.  Each foguere is loaded up with fireworks and then set off to start the foguere on fire. We followed a few of the fogueres on the way home but the crowds were too big to see the foguere on fire. We decided to head home and wait for the burning of our local foguere.

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Shelley and Ray at the local foguere in their neighbourhood at 3 a.m.

Shortly after 4 a.m. the bomberos arrived and our local foguere was set on fire. The video below captured the burning of our local foguere at 4 a.m.

https://youtu.be/pmUetDD5RfE

It was a very busy and interesting week. The festival is the biggest one of the year and attracts thousands of people. We are glad we were here to enjoy it.

“adios y que tengo un gran dia”

 

Spain

Fogueres festival

We continue to walk throughout the city looking at the fogueres that are on display in different barrios. On Tuesday, we headed to another area of the city to scout out the fogueres.

Our first stop was at the local park area which is north of us. We arrived to see a massive foguere on display in the centre of the park.

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Foguere in park 3 storeys high

There was an interesting theme to this foguere. The characters were representing the people involved in the making of the festival in some way.  As we looked at the foguere you could see that they were making light of certain organisations involved in the festival.

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The main organisers of the festival were characterised.

They made fun of the bomberos (Firefighters) with caricatures representing them. Note the enforcement bombero with the measuring tape.

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Bombero with measuring tape making sure the distance is right

Then there is the physically fit bombero setting off fireworks.

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Bomberos the Alicante foguere

They also had caricatures of the music with fireworks.

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Caricatures of the fireworks in the festival

There was also the history of the Alicante region done through fogueres. They started with man discovering fire and working up through time to the future of the Foguere festival.

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Foguere of discovery of fire by man
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History of Lucerum Romans who lived in Alicante
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Moores live in Alicante and build the Castillo of Santa Barbara
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Fireworks tradition is started in Alicante
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Future of fireworks in Alicante

The fogueres were very well done and had an excellent theme.

“Adios y que tenga un gran dia”

Spain

Starting to tour the fogueres

The fogueres are now being constructed and the judging starts in a few days. We went to the tourism bureau and picked up a map with all the locations of the Fogueres. There are 89 fogueres in total this year. Ray mapped out a plan and we are going to try to see all of them.

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Ray with map of the fogueres

Monday morning we headed out to see the fogueres. Each location has both a children’s foguere and an adult foguere for that particular neighbourhood. The first barrio we came to was Jose Antonio. This barrio has been doing the fogueres for sixty years. They celebrated by incorporating the 60 year anniversary into their foguere.

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Front view of the foguere which is approximately 3 storeys high
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The base of the foguere has the 60 anniversary noted
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Back side of the foguere with all-seeing eye

The Children’s foguere was also impressive with several key features including a dragon and witches brew.

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Childrens foguere in the Barrio Jose Antonio

The rear side of the foguere was also well done with a pumpkin, books and little creatures.

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Monday we walked and saw a total of 19 different barrios. The fogueres at each one of them was very unique. The amount of work and dedication it takes to do these fogueres is truly an amazing thing. The colours are extremely vibrant and the details of the figures in the fogueres are extremely well done.

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foguere in Alicante waterfront area
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Three storeys high foguere in centre of street intersection

Some of the fogueres had a specific theme or had a sarcastic message.

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A foguere with advertising built into the theme with some sarcasm

The sign roughly translates to “how to put together your Swedish hoguera.”

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Foguere illustrating the cuts of government money

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Some of the fogueres were extremely ornate and very large using a crane to lower pieces of them onto other pieces.

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crane being used to create a foguere

Below are just some of the unique fogueres we saw on Monday. We will do a “foguere page” at a later time in the blog of all the unique and beautiful fogueres. Note the details of the tattoo on the main character.

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3 storey high foguere with very ornate design
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Dragon tattoo on the back of the character
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Fooguere in centre of the main street
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A floating Foguere on a raft in Marina. The huge foguere will be burnt in the marina.

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We saw over forty different fogueres on Moday and were completely amazed at the amount of detail and work went into each one of them. Ray even managed to get into the spirit of the event when he worked his way into a photo shoot.

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Ray with people in the foguere festival

It was a long day walking around Alicante, looking at some of the Fogueres. The day was very interesting and the fogueres are amazing pieces of art.

“Adios y que tenga un gran dia”

Spain

Fogueres parade

The Fogueres parade was held on Saturday in Alicante. The parade is made up of all the different neighbourhoods who have created a foguere for the festival. This year there is a total of 89 different neighbourhoods creating a foguere. We headed down early to the centre of Alicante to watch the parade procession.

The parade route was lined with chairs which could be rented for a few euros. Some people rented the chairs while others looked for seating in outside pub areas.

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Chairs aligning the entire parade route

We had some time so we walked to Alicante city hall and checked on the progress of the foguere being constructed there. They have added a lot more to it, but there is still quite a bit more to finish it.

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city hall foguere being built

After checking out the progress of the foguere we went back to watch the parade. The parade started with the official elected children (ninos) and women (mujeres) of the 2016 Fogueres.

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The official women of the 2016 fogueres
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The official children of the 2016 fogueres

The procession of official women and children dressed in their ornate dresses and hair pieces led the parade. After the official women and children procession, each neighbourhood foguere group was in the parade. There was a total of eighty-nine different groups. They each had a specific banner identifying their specific  neighbourhood.

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Banner of specific Foguere group

Each group was dressed in their own colours and had a music band playing along with them in the parade route.

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Parade of Fogueres in Alicante

We moved along the parade looking at the many different designs of dresses and enjoyed the parade immensely.

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Selfie at the parade

The parade was very long and went on for quite a while.

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View of part of the parade procession.

There was a mix of ages, from the very young to senior members in the parade.

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Young child in parade sleeping through the event
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Children of all ages were participating in the parade
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walking in the parade young boy and girl in traditional clothing
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wearing traditional shoes and clothing

The colours of all the different groups were spectacular. The traditional dress and clothing were very ornate, colourful and amazing to see. Below are a few of the groups in the parade and a short video of one of the groups band. We definitely enjoyed the parade and all the wonderful traditional dresses on display throughout the parade.

 

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Young girl wearing traditional blue dress

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parade members wearing traditional red dresses

https://youtu.be/j0OTw1GM7HA

“Adios y que tenga un gran dia”

Spain

The first nightime Fireworks show to start the Fogueres Festival.

Friday June 17th at midnight there was a fireworks and sounds display at the El Corte Ingles store. The Corte Ingles is a very large department store located in the commercial centre of Alicante.  We showed up around 11:15 pm and found a good spot to watch the event. People were gathered all around the area waiting for the show.

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Gathering of crowd before the start of the fireworks at El Corte Ingles

There was a school band playing music and entertaining everyone before the start. It was cute the way they played the music. They were not the best but they tried and we enjoyed an Abba song done through a brass band style.

https://youtu.be/eldZBn7iR7w

The start of the fireworks begins with music and two firefighters rappelling off the rooftop of the eight-story building and unveiling the fogueres poster.

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Unveiling of fogueres poster on El Corte Ingles building

Once they repelled down the music and fireworks show  began.

https://youtu.be/w1iJ7zIrKwg

The fireworks were synchronized with music. It was done quite well and added to the entire event. The fireworks display was almost 20 minutes long and had amazing effects at times. Below is a short two-song video of some of the fireworks.

https://youtu.be/tkxrn53J65I

After the fireworks, everyone heads home or to the local pubs. We headed home and followed the large crowd down the street. There were lots of people out enjoying the event.

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On our way home with crowd leaving the fireworks

It was a very good time and we enjoyed the fireworks set off in the heart of the city for everyone to see.

“adios y que tenga un grand dia”